


Through the Needle's Eye of Time

by Ratzinger



Series: Needle's Eye of Time [2]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Ciri Takes No Shit, Elder Blood Shenanigans, Gen, Magic Solves Things Except When It Doesn't, Post-Books, Pre-Games, Time-Space Travel, Time-Space Travel that Goes Wrong, rough start, va'esse deireádh aep eigean, va'esse eigh faidh'ar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:01:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22962805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ratzinger/pseuds/Ratzinger
Summary: 'You are weakening. Bring us out!''You wish!' Ciri fired back with malicious glee. She was the Lady of Time and Space, and this was her decision. 'Drop off if you don’t like it. I’m giving you a choice!'I.e. The "uncensored" version of how the Swallow met the Fox again and decided to give him a run for his money within space-time.
Relationships: Avallac'h | Crevan Espane aep Caomhan Macha & Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon, Avallac'h | Crevan Espane aep Caomhan Macha/Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon
Series: Needle's Eye of Time [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1655209
Comments: 3
Kudos: 35





	Through the Needle's Eye of Time

**Author's Note:**

> This is an excerpt out of a significantly larger story that writes itself from time to time, but remains in an otherwise fragmentary form. In short, I did not believe for one second that Ciri would have accepted Avallac'h's 'help' and started travelling with him without a really-really rough beginning to it. And yet, I find the notion of these two torturing each other somehow satisfying overall; sue me.

Looking up, Ciri knew at once that she had to flee. Immediately.

‘I am not here to hurt you.’

Stepping toward her over frozen heather, softly, silently, like an elf, he could have easily been mistaken for a wraith instead if he had not already been born as the former and wouldn’t have been nevertheless doomed to roam the realms in the shape of the latter. Like an unholy spirit of the dead, whom the gaping void did not accept before a wolf had brought it down three times and lightning had struck its ghostly form for another three. If _he_ had come after her instead of Eredin that day when white lightning scratched the skies… if she had caught sight of those astonished aquamarine eyes, she might not have found the strength and courage she had needed. She was glad he had not come that day.

Yet things had a way of coming around with her.

‘Well,’ she croaked in bewilderment, putting her sword between them, even if it would not help her much. ‘What are you waiting for?’

The wraith spoke gently – always very gently. ‘Take pity, _luned_.’ His attention shifted briefly over to the other side of the ravine. ‘We do not have much time.’

The crowns of the trees tightly filling the ravine rustled ominously as an icy gale tore through them. She felt it deep within her bones, within the tissue that had been infected with whatever magic the masked sorcerer of the Hunt had forced upon her. He was near; she knew it even without looking. Apparitions tearing across the firmament were only occasionally highlighted by the far off blue glow of the full moon, but the wound itself was quite enough.

‘What do you want?’ she hissed. ‘Speak! Quickly!’

‘Your journey, the way you have commandeered a force for which you have been so ill prepared, for which you are still so ill-suited – it has surprised us. It has impressed us a great deal,’ he took a few more steps. ‘However, intuition, talent, and courage can only carry you so far, daughter of the Gull.’

‘ _Quickly_ , I said,’ Ciri hauled herself up against the rotting tree trunk, sending furtive glances around her. No sign of her mare; her beautiful, brave mare she had driven into the trap. The darkness around her remained as still as it had always been; for now.

‘It is Midinváerne. And you have found your way back to the Spiral.’ He eyed her a little sadly. _And the Spiral is ours._ ‘He will catch you tonight, Swallow.’

They said he was never mistaken. ‘Then why are you here? To gloat? To ensure Eredin knows that he couldn't ever have done it without you? Anyway, what is the point of telling me things I already know? Get on with it or get out of my way.’

A little fire lit up in his eyes.

‘Oh, you ‘know’? What do you _know_ , exactly? It intrigues me. Genuinely. How well do you know the elf who haunts your dreams?’

‘You are well aware of what the good general has in store for you now that his hands have been finally unbound, yes? Has he shown you? I’m sure he has; he has never been terribly subtle. Did you also, perchance, _foresee_ yourself standing here, trapped, vulnerable, and alone? Did you know it all already, back then, in the gazebo? Did he inspire you to come up with a clever plan of your own to outwit fate?’

Ciri narrowed her eyes, but could not suppress a furious blush at the memory; at the many unwanted memories his insinuations summoned.

‘Or did you think we would give up on you? Leave you to live out your precious, miserably short life in insignificance until the accursed mortality of your ancestors would break you and wipe away the last trace of… of hope,’ his voice changed a little as he finished, and he had come very near her now; dangerously so. ‘He is gone, _luned._ And yet, _va'esse deireádh aep eigean, va'esse eigh faidh'ar_. No, I do not wish to gloat, but I do not think you know very much at all. Of yourself or of those you so revile.’

Softly, silently, Ciri pressed the tip of Gwyhyr through his chest. He did not flinch or look away. Only smiled at her wryly.

‘What do you want, Avallac’h?’ she whispered.

He swallowed. ‘To help you.’

‘Really? Because I have vivid recollections of what your help entails. Of the _conditions_ under which it is offered to those who are not equal,’ the cold around her heart trembled violently. However, Ciri still had to ask the forbidden question; the question that would always end up betraying her. She should not question so much, but trust her instincts. ‘Why would you do this?’

‘I am interested in seeing what would happen,’ he paused, looking at her strangely, 'if something more were necessary.’

A resounding crack echoed below them in the bottom of the ravine where a narrow stream made its way above the ground, and a horse whinnied in agitation.

‘Kelpie! I –‘

He wrapped his palm around the blade, stepping to the side, off her sword, and stretched out his hand toward her. Her eyes played tricks on her: he was tangible, but not enough to bleed. The blade cut through his chest like through butter. Several other hollow cracks sounded from the gully.

‘Take my hand. Pull me into this world in earnest, and I will guide you off the Spiral. Beyond, if need be. I know the way better than you.’

‘What!?’ her eyes widened. ‘Do you take me for a birdbrain? No, I will not… I have to get Kelpie, but the bracelet –‘

‘Look at me! Look. At me. Listen to me, Zireael. You are out of time. Let me sever your bindings; take my hand,’ he insisted again with urgency entirely unbecoming of an elf such as himself. And when she made to turn away from him instead, he reached out to her – also entirely unbecoming of an elf. ‘I would not be talking to you if I wanted you harmed.’

 _Doubtful._ She was sure he was well aware of his own gift with words.

A flock of nightjars took flight from one of the many craning treetops at the sound of intruders climbing up the ravine’s side in their heavy armour, which, despite being magnificently silent overall, still groaned when its ice encasing broke and fell among the debris on the forest floor. For a moment, the birds obscured the light of the moon. Ciri raised her eyes from where the wraith’s hand had grasped her own. It made her uncomfortable; it lacked all sensation of touch and felt very much like being held by an invisible force. Not unlike the force that had trapped her in the first place.

‘Why can’t you help me right now?’

He grimaced. ‘This has never been a fair fight, _luned_ ,’ Ciri’s blood boiled at his words. ‘I offer you my help, my knowledge. Let me guide you out of here and let us see if we can come to see eye to eye afterward. But only like this is it possible. Only if I can know that you accept it. Take me with you! For otherwise, they already have you.’

 _You are lying_ , Ciri did not let the thought escape the realm of what many would have called womanly intuition on the off chance he was reading her mind, but knew it nonetheless. _Yet what choice do I have?_ She glanced over her shoulder and saw the eerie lights that followed the wraiths, behind whom strode the masked mage who had located her time and again. If he was here already then the King of the Hunt could not have been far behind.

‘Zireael, I give you my word.’

‘Fuck your word!’ she spat, but didn't manage to tear herself away from him as she had wanted. Immense pain shot through her sides, hollowing her out as it went, and in its wake was left only the unyielding cold. Cold that encased a living thing in a shell, that made it tremble, that brought it low. That ate away at its inborn source. A portal opened somewhere nearby; too near.

‘Do not make me beg,’ he spoke quietly to the woman crouching in the heather. ‘Please,’ he added in a second.

Her fingers curled faintly around the apparition’s, feeling absolutely nothing but resistance through the thin air that it occupied. Nothing, except the pulsation of energy that appeared at her fingertips and began to dance violently as something strange brushed up against it, inviting her to fight against it, to suffocate it. To give way before it. She heard shouts and another set of portals opening not five meters away from where she kneeled, darkness materializing around her in moon light. And then, as the touch around her hand suddenly became tangible, Ciri froze, feeling the eternal cold of the void piercing her skin with an unmistakable craving to it; it sought a way into her blood in a manner that was both irresistible and profane. Something inside her healed, but something else broke. Avallac’h was no longer looking at her for his interest was being held by someone else; someone to whom she saw him sending an extraordinarily nasty smile.

_Star Eyes, what have you done? Oh, Star Eyes. Do not let them! Do not play along in their games._

_I do not have a choice. I am sorry, I do not have –_

_There is always a choice, Star Eyes. Always! Remember, you do not owe them anything._

But Avallac’h had sensed a change come over her, and when Ciri tore herself away and jumped it was already too late.

The space-time compressed around her, her temples pounding with pain as the primeval cold assaulted her once more, rushing under her skin like something mad with no other aim but the single-minded craving to overcome, to possess, to rip her apart. It usually happened in a flash; now it felt as though she was being sucked into the darkness that followed the jump. It had never been this terrible before and it burned the fiercest where the sorcerer had caught hold of her. Without Kelpie to ground her, she felt like falling eternally.

_I do not believe you! Let go of me! Let go, I say!_

For several obvious reasons, he did not let go.

They were being stretched thin as a rivulet between the planes of time and space and Ciri suddenly realised what immense trouble she had let herself get into. From the claws of one into the jaws of another. She could not trust him; she simply could not! She could feel the elf latch onto the folds of her jacket, gripping mercilessly, his pale eyes starting to burn with hollow fire. No longer a spectre, no longer a powerless phantom in the void. No. She had pulled him with her, from the dim corridors of the aether and into the bends and folds of the cosmic labyrinth.

 _He has done this before; he knows what will happen_ , she realised. _Oh, you fool! You gigantic fool!_ But she’d be damned if she would allow him to ride on her wings tax free.

Tearing herself from the path and throwing them both through the first crack in the wall of nothingness, they slipped into a new reality. Wind stung her face with needles innumerable as they settled into a more realistic kind of free fall. She could see the vast blue underneath them approaching fast but before Ciri could think of anything, a deafening crack swallowed her whole and the world went dark as if a chasm had opened up mid-air. Moments later they exited the portal and plunged into cold water.

Everything from her eyes and lips to her wounds was suddenly on fire. The water was outlandishly salty. A pair of hands dragged her above the surface level. By the devils how it stung! Ciri coughed and spluttered, registering only that the water did not come up any higher than her waist. But it was everywhere – fields of gently lapping waves, as far as the eye could see.

‘Don’t!’ an arm that sought to secure itself around her waist impeded her from reaching for her dagger. ‘I am not your enemy.’

‘Unhand me!’

‘You should listen –‘

‘Sod off!’ somehow she got her fingers wrapped around the soft leather hilt. The magician’s lips opened, but Ciri resorted to not letting him finish the incantation.

This time the landing hurt considerably more. Air cushioned her for but a blink of an eye until the room was buried in cries of shock and fear, the shattering of glass, and the echo of silverware falling on the floor. A cascade of what sounded like trumpets, horns, and various string instruments abruptly cancelled their repertoire. Hitting a table with a resounding thud, Ciri had a moment to reflect if she had not broken a rib this time, before the sage fell down on top of her.

_A rib, or three._

For some reason, it still came as a total surprise to her that the elves she knew were not very delicate. Ciri choked and the elf groaned against her shoulder.

 _What are you doing, luned_?

She did not reply. An animalistic roar resounded underneath the vaulted ceilings, silencing the nervous, incomprehensible tittle-tattle of voices. There, behind a legion of colourful dotted dresses and shining, elegant shoes loomed a cat the size of a little horse, its flaming, striped fur bristling with the same fury that echoed from in-between its enormous jaws. On its head sat a little red beret. Without hesitation, Ciri quickly decided to make herself scarce once more.

A quiet, open expanse under three red moons followed. A barn – more precisely, a haystack in the barn – where they scared a number of chickens and cap-wearing young men who were preparing apple juice for the winter. Then a mountain road filled with pilgrims of ashen skin and long, elegant tails. Even a sandstorm in which lifting her legs across the surface of the earth was nay impossible and which began shredding her clothes instantly during the few seconds she spent in that realm.

_You are weakening. Bring us out!_

_You wish!_ Ciri fired back with malicious glee. She was the Lady of Time and Space, and this was her decision. _Drop off if you don’t like it. I’m giving you a choice!_

Nevertheless, the length of time they spent squashed in-between the fabric of reality was shortening with each flight. She was being squeezed and released like a small doll, over and over and over again until a violent sense of foreboding took hold of her. She needed to rest in-between jumps. It surprised even herself how swiftly, how quickly she managed to sequence her jumps right now. But she could not stop now. Because when the Hunt’s mystic cold had almost petrified her heart and she had taken the gamble and allowed the sage to free her – the touch of his hand on hers had still resembled the touch of death.

They landed on the edge of white cliffs besieged by waves and drowning in thick and sombre fog. In near distance, across the foaming breakers and sharp rocks, stood a crumbling tower. It loomed at the end of a thin stretch of land that reached out into the sea and if one strained their eyes, they could see an occasional gull swoop out of the fog and dive toward the grey-green depths underneath. Ciri’s stomach churned at the sight, her eyes widening in horror. She had been here before, and in other places more or less identical. No matter where or when she ventured, eventually, she would always end up near water and a tower.

The space around her cracked into million tiny lines, big and small, tight as a spider web. It leeched onto her and rejected her all at once, questioning why it could not shift her around and flatten her out into a single bit of stardust-covered string in the great web of time. Why was she making so much noise with her wings, it wanted to ask her.

Warm and leaden weight was wrapping itself around her insides, lulling the swirling force inside her and taking hold of her will. It was becoming difficult to think, to imagine, to see and feel her way through the maze. And suddenly, she sensed it rather than heard – the incantations weaving their way inside her like fae song.

_Do not be afraid, Loc’hlaith._

She could only glare at him with disbelief. He had imprisoned her when she had first met him in a tower that stood over a lake where unicorns came to drink. Time was a flat circle; nothing could ever change.

A crack. The woman and the elven sorcerer hit the wet and uneven ground at high speed with the earth punishing them for their arrogance by whipping their faces and flaying their backs at every subsequent turn they took, rolling over each other like a pair of animals. At last he was forced to let go. Ciri wheezed, vomited, and collapsed. She had only just evaded a glistening boulder that could have easily crushed her skull. The air was white with rain.

 _Get up! Up! Move!_ The elf was also getting back on his feet, unfortunately having also missed the said boulder. There was no time; she had to fly before the jaws of the sorcery he was weaving around her could come crushing down. She went for her sword at first but then decided against it in a moment of vertigo; she was beginning to see double and it was too obvious. _A little rest, only a little rest. I can do this._ The elf moved faster than her. _I can still do this._ When he got within arm’s length, in her estimate, Ciri ducked, half falling and half diving, and sliced, letting the cut of the small, mean blade drag for all it was worth. Enough to render flesh open like a ripe pear and to cause a significant amount of pain; not enough to incapacitate. _Damn!_

She closed her eyes, pleased by the nasty growl he had emitted, and concentrated. Fighting against the warning pain that tingled along her spine, she tried to think of a place, safe and difficult to reach, and drew on the source within her –

Without success.

So she tried again; and failed, again.

‘No. No, no, please! This cannot – What did you do!?’

Thunder buried her cry underneath the treeline. Weapon flew from her hand and she lost her footing over the end of a staff. Ciri tried once more, but to no avail. He pinned her to the ground, crushing her wrists without care. Images swam before her eyes, of places she did not know, times she had never witnessed; strange, alien visions that did not belong inside her head and yet, she saw them. They stared into each other’s eyes, the unnatural glow of primal source slowly draining away from his, then hers.

‘Do not try again! You will kill us both, you foolish child!’

A malevolent will reared its head within Ciri’s heart, but before she could give voice to the hateful wish and utter a curse, the magician waved his hand before her eyes and everything went dark.

-

He watched the muscles in her limbs grow very soft and very still, her breathing slowing, her eyes closing under the weight of magic. Timeless emerald eyes, in which one could trace the threads that held together galaxies. A gaze that but moments ago had blazed with vindictive fury. He hated those eyes. _Yearned for them._ Eyes that had wanted to believe him, yet had nevertheless decided against it in the end. _Her_ eyes. Like stars, long dead and cold, he could still see their light from here, from another time and place where they still existed.

_In every moment of time lies eternity. All that is or ever will be has already happened._

Rain beat down upon his back, kicking up dirt around the girl’s marred, frost-bitten, utterly _human_ face that he was shielding from the elements. The smell of ozone clung to them as if they were made of it. Somewhere in the back of his mind, the sage could sense a rip in the fabric of the world, a newly born thread of possibilities disintegrating and weaving things anew so that what had come to be seemed as if having forever belonged there. What is a paradox but a little bit of misremembered time? But at this very second, he could not bring himself to care. Taking another deep breath, the Fox let go of the Swallow’s wrists and collapsed next to her.

How close she had been to ruin; too close to be aware about it as she tore them both through the needle’s eye of time, skating, headstrong, along the twin-edges of destiny. The vestiges of her power clung to him, and he to them, as he directed the current, shifted it around in-between his cells as it evaporated; it made him feel deeply elated and anxious, and quite drunk on it. Its familiarity, primarily, and its sweet torture and the nauseating rightness of it – of being able to pervert the delicate balance between all existence and witnessing first-hand how little the universe cared. No retribution, divine or otherwise, awaited them; unlike their horned friends would have had them believe aeons ago.

_Only eternity._

Smiling idiotically, and thinking like this to himself as he bled under the flashing white lighting high above, Avallac’h closed his eyes.


End file.
